Angola Rebels Deny Cocaine Trafficking

Angola’s UNITA rebels Friday challenged U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to produce evidence that the group is bartering cocaine for weapons and stolen cars from South Africa.

UNITA Secretary-General Paulo Lukamba Gato told Reuters the accusations, made recently by a U.N. official, were baseless.

“It is all part of a United Nations’ conspiracy to dent UNITA and its leadership. They must come clean and present the evidence to an international audience or panel,” Gato said in a telephone interview from his bush headquarters.

He was responding to claims by an unnamed senior U.N. official who told Reuters in a recent interview that UNITA was suspected of bartering South American cocaine for weapons and stolen vehicles from South Africa for its war with Luanda.

“We have reason to believe that cocaine from producer nations like Colombia is being smuggled to Angola’s southern border with Namibia via Brazil,” the official, who asked not to be named, told Reuters.

The drug enforcement official said the drugs were believed to come through Brazil because of the Portuguese language connection shared by the two countries.

But Gato, who is deputy to the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola’s (UNITA) leader Jonas Savimbi, challenged Annan to produce evidence of the drug dealing or set up an international team to investigate.

“In the interests of natural justice and fair play, we in UNITA challenge Mr. Annan to produce this evidence that we deal in drugs. We deny the charges absolutely,” Gato said.

“We also challenge Mr Annan, as head of the United Nations, to constitute an international team to examine the so-called evidence. If he fails to do so UNITA shall consider the U.N. its enemy,” he added.

A senior regional analyst at the Pretoria-based Institute for Security Studies told Reuters the institute had found no evidence that UNITA was involved in cocaine trade.

“There is no evidence as far as we are concerned that UNITA deals in drugs [cocaine] for vehicles,” Jakkie Potgieter said.

“How do these trucks or vehicles get to UNITA from South Africa? Our evidence indicates UNITA barters a lot in secondhand clothes and radio batteries,” he said.

Potgieter, who closely follows the war and political events in Angola, said Brazil and Namibia were hostile to UNITA and unlikely to allow traffic for the rebel group.

Angola descended back into civil war in December last year after the unraveling of a shaky four-year peace deal between the government and its arch-foe, UNITA.

UNITA funds it war efforts through illegal sales of diamonds, worth millions of dollars annually, in areas under its control.

Tuesday, South Africa’s De Beers, which controls about 70% of global diamond sales through its London-based Central Selling Organization, announced it would no longer buy stones from Angola, responding to years of criticism from pressure groups.

But UNITA, formed by Savimbi in 1966, said De Beers’ decision would do little to dent the movement’s strength.